


A Desert Called Ocean

by Sylversmith



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Desert Siren Temari, F/M, Original Character Death(s), Shadow Spirit Shikamaru
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-22
Updated: 2020-09-04
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:02:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25437379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sylversmith/pseuds/Sylversmith
Summary: Fantasy AU written for Naruto Fantasy Week 2020, Day 6: Elemental Spirits, Sirens.Shikamaru is an elemental spirit kidnapped from his home for a power that he doesn't want. Temari is a desert siren cursed to feed on the lives of others to perpetuate her own. When the two are bound by fate and magic, they have no choice but to go on a journey that will force them to face the ghosts of their pasts.
Relationships: Nara Shikamaru/Temari
Comments: 17
Kudos: 23





	1. The Secret in the Sands

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! This started as a one shot for Naruto Fantasy Week 2020, but the story quickly evolved further than I intended, so I made it into my first multi chapter. My plan is to post a new chapter update every month.
> 
> Please leave a comment if you enjoyed!

**The vast... desert undulates with almost imperceptible tides like the oceans.** Frank Waters

Shikamaru did not often feel like a fool.

Sure, there was that time when his mother trapped him in a fae contract when he was only a few decades old and forced him to wear spider web silk singlets for most of his formative life. There was also that time that Ino took control of his body while he was sleeping and told the nymph Shiho that he was interested in courting her. And sure, his father seemed to have an innate ability to outsmart him while barely even trying.

However, all in all he still considered himself to be incredibly intelligent.

Which only made his current predicament all the more frustrating.

“Did you really seal me inside of an oil lamp?”

“I don’t mind a cliche if it works. And considering these runes held a djinn for a thousand years, it definitely works.”

Despite not knowing exactly why an oil lamp would be a cliched sealing vessel, nor what a djinn was, the man’s confidence in his confinement was enough to sap Shikamaru’s hope to break through the seals under his own power. He half heartedly pushed once more against the wall, unsurprised when nothing changed, and let his being settle in the inky blackness. Without a more powerful physical manifestation, his magic was nye worthless, and any attempt to fight against his prison would only drain his energy.

Instead, he tried his best to ignore the subtle sense of panic that prowled at the edge of his mind; a byproduct of being truly imprisoned for the first time in his life. He channeled his focus on the familiar magic of the forest, pulsing in the very air around him, the sound of birdsong in the distance, the crunch of leaves on the forest floor beneath the feet of his captor, each footstep sounding in time with the rhythmic rocking of the vessel that must have been strapped to the stranger’s hip.

The sensory visualization helped him slip into a meditative calm, restoring his equilibrium, or at least quelling the wave of fear enough for him to focus on the matter at hand. Although rare, it wasn’t the first time a mortal had captured one of his kind, and it was always in some misguided hope that they could garner some sort of magical boon, as if something as simple as magic could solve the intricacies of life. The desires themselves seemed to be unique to the person, but the pattern always remained the same. Which meant the sooner he discovered what exactly this human wanted, the sooner he could earn his freedom.

He was interrupted before he could even start asking the question.

“Did you really leave a soul tether in the middle of the forest?”

Shikamaru decided that there wasn’t anything to be gained from trying to justify something that was barely a decision in the first place. Even now, he did his best to avoid looking at the simple amulet that sat nestled in the shallow basin of the lamp, even if he couldn’t stop his shadows from gently wrapping around the trinket.

“It’s not like it wasn’t hidden.”

He was ashamed to note that his voice sounded petulant, even to himself.

“That’s true. I’ll admit that it was rather clever, hiding a fire talisman behind a waterfall. However,” the stranger’s voice turned jovial, swelling with pride. “I’m a Hyuuga tracker.”

Shikamaru felt his heart rate spike at the name. “The Hyuuga are a myth.” The sense of fear only increased when he heard the faint, but loudening sounds of clinking metal, stamping hooves, and the soft murmuring of voices.

“You think that a band of arcanic hunters with special eyes that can see magic is any more of a myth than shadow wraiths that can bind to humans, making them immortal?”

Shikamaru’s being froze in place. “No, you don’t understand. It doesn’t work like-”

“Boss! You’re back early. Any luck?”

Shikamaru abruptly stopped talking, not wanting to give anymore information to these new humans. He tried to focus on their conversation, frantically hoping for a miracle that would grant him his freedom.

“Boys, I’ve got good news and bad news.”

The men grew silent.

“The bad news is that I’m going to need you to pack up camp and get ready to travel in the hour.”

A small team of voices objected to the announcement before their leader signaled them to settle down. “The good news is that I found something that will earn us a fortune in the western market.”

Once again, the others grew quiet, but this time there was an underlying expectation in the air; like a pack of wolves catching the whiff of prey.

“Wha… what is it? A fairy?”

“Or, maybe a dragon’s egg?”

“Oh! Did you find the fountain of youth?”

“Close! How much do you think the Zindaran Emperor would pay for a creature that can make him immortal?”

The vessel shifted suddenly, throwing Shikamaru and the amulet against the wall of the lamp, as the Hyuuga undoubtedly pulled the lamp off of his belt to show his audience.

“Ow!”

“Wait… is that it? You caught it inside of the lamp?”

“Yeah, so make sure, whatever happens, you don’t open the lid.”

Shikamaru felt all of his nerves and fear transform into a burning rage unlike any he ever felt before. “I don’t know what you’ve been told, but you’re wrong. That kind of magic connection isn’t something that can be made on a whim, and has repercussions just like any other!”

“What is it talking about?”

“I’m trying to tell you that the ‘ritual’ you’re talking about-” Shikamaru suddenly cut off his retort as a short bolt of magic coursed through the lamp’s seals, shocking his system.

“Just another fae trying to trick us into releasing it. One hour, men. Trust me, we don’t want to be in this forest when its friends realize it’s missing.”

“It’s not a tri-”

“That’s enough out of you,” his captor hissed at him, leaving his men to start breaking down their temporary shelter. His voice was no louder than a whisper and steeped in anger. “I let you speak your piece, but make no mistake- you will be coming with us to the western market, and when the time comes, you will bind yourself to the highest bidder, or I come back here with a carafe of dragon’s fire and burn this entire forest to the ground. Do I make myself clear?”

Shikamaru was stunned for a moment at the vitriolic words, but even the threat to his home couldn’t quite quell his desperation. “I don’t know where you got your information, but you must know that the connection you’re talking about isn’t just some simple ritual, but a soul bond. There’s a reason why we only make these bonds with the Sarutobi wizards-”

“I didn’t ask for a lecture from a creature that has never left the Konohan forest. I’m well aware that either of your souls can consume the other, and honestly, that’s none of my concern. I only care about one thing, and that’s the sound the gold makes in my purse.” 

The conviction and truth in the man’s voice hit Shikamaru harder than any blow he had received in his life, and, combined with the threat against the forest, finally drew him to silence. While his captors focused on preparing to travel, his shadows pooled around the talisman, absently drawing comfort from the artifact while his mind incessantly worked to figure out any method to help him escape.

Because Shikamaru was done feeling like a fool.

* * *

Even though he couldn’t see anything outside of the lamp, Shikamaru felt the moment they crossed the treeline and left the forest. He had known it would happen eventually, and tried to mentally prepare himself for the shift, but there was no way for him to predict the feeling of “nothingness” that pervaded his senses; the complete absence of everything he had ever known.

He wanted to weep, to mourn the loss of something that he never thought he would be without. Instead, he channeled that energy into his resolve, and reminded himself every step away from Konoha was one more step between the Hyuuga and everything he truly cared about.

He started speaking when they stopped to set up their camp.

It started as a basic conversation, seemingly simple questions that he would expect his captors had heard thousands of times before.

“Where are we now?”

“How long will we be travelling?”

“Where are you from?”

It wasn’t until late in the night, when their cooking fire had burnt down to smoking coals and they started preparing to sleep, that they discovered that he had no intention of stopping.

“Is it always this cold at night?”

“How can you tell the difference between a dream and reality?”

“What do humans do for fun?”

They tried to ignore him, but found that if he didn’t receive an answer, he would repeat the question incessantly until someone answered. Finally, in the middle of the night, they buried the lamp inside of one of their traveling chests, finding that the long lengths of mermaid silks they had procured in Kiri muffled his voice enough for them to fall into a brief sleep. They were tempted to leave the lamp packed away during the day, but their leader insisted on carrying the lamp with him, wary of any misfortune that could separate him from their prize.

“Do you have a family?”

“What is it like having the Byakugan?”

“What’s the strangest place you’ve ever been?”

The situation worsened when they passed another caravan on the road and Shikamaru immediately called out for help. It was not particularly difficult to assuage the other travelers’ concerns and to prove that their captive was not human, especially with one of the notorious Hyuuga leading their band. However, the experience made them realize that it would be nearly impossible to stop in any of the small towns scattered along their route without risking major delays.

“Do you run into other travelers often?”

“How long have you been a magic hunter?”

“What’s your favorite color?”

Days passed. Shikamaru’s voice grew rough with the strain of continually speaking, but he refused to stop. He knew that humans needed to sleep more frequently than his own kind, but without the natural magic of the forest around him, he began to feel even his energy wane. It was particularly troublesome because since that first encounter, his captors proved to be exceedingly capable at avoiding contact with other people, limiting his chances to call for help. Still, he persisted, trying his best to ignore the swelling desperation that grew in his heart.

A desperation that peaked when he heard the tinkling sound of sand beating against the side of the metal lamp.

“Where are we?”

He heard a few of the men halfheartedly respond “the Kaiyo Desert”, so weary of his constant questioning that they had begun answering without fully listening to him. The Hyuuga, however, was not one of them.

“You seem concerned.” Even when exhausted, the man’s voice still seemed to drip with smugness.

“Why would I be concerned?”

“I would imagine it’s because you know that the Kaiyo Desert is the last leg of our journey. Two days, maybe three, and-” the man suddenly drew silent. “That’s odd… the wind shifted. Souta! Are you still keeping an eye on the skies?”

It was the first time any of the men had failed to answer one of their leader’s questions, and the tension in the air immediately brought Shikamaru to attention. Something was… different.

“Souta, you better have a damned good reason-” the Hyuuga suddenly lurched to a stop, body locked mid step, and Shikamaru realized that all of the men had grown unnaturally quiet. He could hear them breathing, hear the sound of them shifting around on their wagons of goods, but all of them had frozen in place, like bowstrings pulled taunt, waiting for some unknown signal to release.

From his place in the lamp, Shikamaru tried his best to focus what limited energy he had left into listening, trying to find any indication of what was happening around him. The moment stretched. One moment became two. And then, carried by the slightest puff of air, he heard it. The faint whisper of a woman’s voice seeped in magic, whispering soft nothings in an unknown language of power. Shikamaru recoiled from the spell, subconsciously tapping into the stores of power within the amulet- a power that he had resisted using for decades- to repel the trap before it could spring.

_ Come to me. _

The strings snapped, and the men lurched forward.

* * *

Temari idly twirled the ornate knife between her fingers, gauging the balance of the blade as it spun around her hand. When the handle landed in her palm, she whipped her arm, flinging the weapon away from her. Her eyebrows pinched together in annoyance when she noted that it flew too far left, entirely missing the plank of wood that she had been using as a target and burying itself in the sand dune behind it.

She hated this time of the month, the feeling of weakness that saturated her being, but that shouldn’t have been enough to render her incapable of throwing a knife accurately.

Her wings absently fanned the air, layering her spell into the winds and redirecting the gusts to sweep across the dunes of sand. They thrust down harder, lifting her clawed talons from the sand and propelling her to the point where her knife had disappeared from view. She carefully dug through the sand, focused on finding the weapon, when she heard the first shout.

She sighed to herself. No matter how many times she went through this, it never seemed to get any easier.

The first man who crested the dune had already begun to succumb to her magic. His fine silk clothes hung loose on his shoulders and hips, signs of his body’s deterioration that only accelerated once his frenzied eyes met her own. He took a few steps forward before collapsing, his muscles too weak to hold him upright, and began crawling through the sand to reach her, desperately begging her to be with him, heedless of his draining life. He had lost control of his entire lower body by the time the second man appeared on the horizon.

One after another they appeared, drawn like moths to the flame of her magic. She forced herself to watch them all, feeling a morbid sense of obligation to be with them in their final moments as each of their life forces fed her own.

The final man scrambled over the lifeless bodies of his comrades, his pale, pearl eyes staring at her as if she were his salvation rather than his destruction. He reached out his hand, desperate to reach her, even while his body continued to waste away.

“Beautiful.”

His hand fell, lifeless in the sand.

Temari let out the breath that she had been holding, disgusted by the renewed strength she felt coursing through her body, and wiped at her eyes.

It was done.

She slowly moved towards the corpses, determined to honor whatever religious burial practices she could recognize by their keepsakes. She began with the first man who had found her, and slowly worked her way through them all, taking note of rings, pendants, tattoos. One by one she sorted them until she reached the last man, still collapsed face down in the sand. She reached for his shoulder to flip him over, but froze when she noticed the intricate bronze lamp secured to his hip. The artifact was well polished and had obviously been a dear possession. She removed it from the clasp, turning it from side to side, and heard the soft clink of metal on metal.

She frowned, confused, and removed the cap of the vessel to investigate.

An inky blackness exploded from the confines of the lamp, darting into the dark patch of shadow beneath her feet. She tried to spring away but found that her entire body, from the soles of her feet to the tips of her wings, was bound in place.

She growled, deep within her throat, fighting the compulsion with everything she had.

“Calm down, I’m not going to hurt you.”

Temari watched as her shadow slowly lengthened and morphed before solidifying into a lithe young man with pale, clear skin, dark hair tied up on his head, dark eyes that seemed just a little too wise for his age, and a pair of antlers that rose out from his head. The spell holding her shifted slightly, and she realized that he had given her control of her head.

She used the opportunity to spit at his feet. “I don’t make deals with fae.”

“I’m not fae, and I’m not looking for a deal. I just need your help.”

“Ok, let me clarify, I don’t  _ help fae-like _ creatures.”

She saw his eyes dart around, quickly taking in all the details he could from their surroundings, before stopping to stare at the collection of bodies. “You killed them.”

A gust of wind swept between them, and Temari felt her wing twitch in response. His head immediately swiveled around, and she had just a moment to recognize the desperation and terror in his eyes before his magic buckled. She crouched down, ready to use her wings to launch herself into the air, but he had already moved. Just before she could propel herself upwards, she felt a chain settle around her neck while a small, cool hand pushed a metal pendant into her chest. By the time she had broken away, her mind was already fading to blackness.


	2. The Enemy of my Enemy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some scenes from the past, and one contentious conversation in the present.
> 
> Alternatively, Shikamaru is exhausted and just trying to keep it together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Apologies that this chapter is a bit late, but it called for a few extra scenes that weren't included in the original outline, and when I finally got into the meat of what I had planned, I realized that it was stretching longer than I wanted. Therefore, you get this section, and the knowledge that half of the next chapter is pretty much already finished.

**“I said it was a dream, and he agreed, But said it was the desert's dream not his. And he told me that in a year or so, when he had aged enough for any man, then he would walk into the wind…”** Neil Gaiman, Smoke and Mirrors: Short Fiction and Illusions

* * *

He found himself back in the forest. The dappled light streamed through the canopy above his head, casting everything with a faint green undertone. He breathed deeply, appreciating the smell of damp soil and composting leaves and let his mind drift, only startling for a moment when a chittering squirrel raced past him through the underbrush. His body relaxed one muscle at a time, comfortably sprawled on his back while he traced the clouds that slowly swam through the small windows of sky above him.

After so many days away, he couldn’t help but feel an aching nostalgia in his heart.

“Shikamaru”

He turned his head, ignorant of the scene warping on the edge of his periphery, as his attention turned and focused on the voice that he had willed himself to forget.

“Asuma”

He wanted to leap to his feet, to race to his side and embrace him, to ask him how he had survived all of these years. Instead, his body lazily turned away, remaining relaxed and wholly indifferent to the burning energy in his mind.

It had been a very long time since he had last experienced a shared memory and he had nearly forgotten what it was like.

The wizard lazily approached and settled himself to the side, taking out a tobacco pipe once he was comfortable. Shikamaru watched him pack the leaves from the corner of his eye and let out a heavy breath when the man pulled on the chain around his neck, grabbing the small, familiar amulet that emerged from under his shirt.

“I thought that your dad told you not to use the talisman for stuff like that.”

He shot Shikamaru a wry grin and flicked his thumb along the side of the pendant, summoning a small flame. “I won’t tell him if you don’t.” He puffed a few times through the pipe, then tucked the trinket back inside of his shirt, using one of his arms to prop himself up from the ground.

Shikamaru merely snorted in response, refocusing on the patchwork of light and shadow above him. “I won’t tell him, but don’t complain to me when Inoichi reads your mind and rats you out.”

Asuma chuckled. “Fair enough.” The two once again fell into a comfortable silence, and Shikamaru felt his eyelids slowly grow heavier.

“Do you ever feel like there should be more?”

Shikamaru felt a stab of irritation at being disturbed when he was just about to fall asleep, but considered the question anyway. “More to what?”

“To this,” Asuma gestured vaguely around them, “to life.” He drew deeply at the pipe in his mouth and let out the smoke in a breath that sounded more like a sigh. “Everyone just keeps telling me about our history and traditions and how we’re destined to follow ‘in the footsteps of our ancestors’” his voice took on a gruff tone that Shikamaru recognized to be an impression of his father. “But it’s all focused here, on the forest. What about the rest of the world? I guess it just feels like there should be… more.”

Shikamaru considered the question for a moment and then did his best to shrug while reclined on the ground. “Well, considering the circumstances, it isn’t like we have much choice in the matter. Besides, if there is more to this, then we have plenty of time to figure it out.” Shikamaru saw an unfamiliar emotion flicker across the man’s face, so he continued watching, waiting to see how he would respond. 

“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

The Shikamaru from his past seemed content with the response, finally letting his eyes slide close to sleep. As he lost consciousness, the scene began to slip away, and the Shikamaru of the present felt his anguish return.

Not only because he was once again losing the familiarity of his home and his friend, but because he had learned enough in life to recognize the emotion that he saw shining in Asuma’s eyes in a way that he hadn’t when it had occurred all of those years ago.

It was resignation.

* * *

When he opened his eyes again, he was unsurprised to find himself in another place and time, but still enveloped in the hazy quality of another shared memory. The small room was sparsely furnished, and its dark, earthen walls reminded him of his recent imprisonment, triggering a vague sense of unease that was swiftly quelled by the colorful light and fresh air that poured in through the tapestry-covered windows. A few baubles hung from chains, catching and reflecting pin pricks of sunlight that splashed against the otherwise empty walls. 

He heard a soft humming behind him, and turned his attention to the memory’s other occupant.

She was sprawled on her stomach on a thin stuffed mat on the floor, head propped up by her arms, carefully studying markings and drawings on a worn animal skin, her eyebrows furrowed in concentration. He was half tempted to peer over her shoulder to see what had so completely captivated her attention, but stopped when she started kicking her feet in time with her own tune.

Her entirely human feet.

He frowned and looked more closely at her face, wondering if he had somehow confused this human child for the harpy woman he had bound in his shadow, but one look at her distinctive hair style and piercing eyes was all it took to confirm that the two truly were the same person.

Interesting.

Without warning, she shifted her position and pushed herself upright, looking surreptitiously towards the door before reaching under the mat. She pulled out a pair of ornately decorated hand fans and reverently ran her fingers over their well shined surface, smiling at her reflection. While she was preoccupied, Shikamaru glanced over at the animal skin she had been examining and saw a series of human caricatures drawn in different poses across the page.

When he looked back, she had moved to the middle of the room and crouched down, her arms crossed over her abdomen. She once again began to hum the same tune as before, and slowly rose into a standing position, opening the fans and spreading her arms in time with her ascension until she was fully upright, her arms thrown out to her sides and the fans fully unfurled. One by one, she moved through each position on the page, sometimes wobbling through the transitions and spins, but always recovering her balance before she could fall. By the time she struck the final pose, her humming was laced by heavy pants, but her face had broken out into a radiant smile. A smile that fell as soon as she looked to the door and saw a small, brown haired boy hovering in the alcove.

“Wait, Kankuro, it isn’t-”

“You took Mom’s fans! I’m telling!”

“No Kankuro! You gremlin!”

The young boy turned and sprinted out of the room, disappearing from view. The girl turned back to her bed, carefully placing the fans down before turning back to follow, but froze before she could take more than a step or two towards the door.

“And what do we have here?”

A young woman with sandy hair and deep violet eyes entered the room, letting the small boy, Kankuro, cower behind her leg. The young girl tried to use her own body to hide the fans that were still laid out on the bed, but the taller woman easily peered over the top of her head.

“Mom! She was using your fans again, even though she  _ knows _ she’s not supposed to.”

The woman smiled kindly back at the boy. “Thank you for telling me, Kankuro.” She turned to face the girl again. “Is that true?”

She looked to the side, debating between admitting the obvious truth or trying to argue, but finally let out a sigh of defeat. “Yes, mom.”

“Hmm… and you found one of the training lessons for the traditional dances.” The woman gracefully crossed the room and bent down, retrieving the old skin and both fans. When she snapped them shut, the audible sound of metal sliding on metal filled the room, and Shikamaru realized that they were much more dangerous than simple accessories.

“I didn’t steal it or anything, I just…” she grew quiet when her mother turned back, the smile gone and replaced by a stern look. “I’m sorry, I should have spoken to you or Baki-sensei first.”

Her mother continued to watch her for a few moments before letting out her own sigh. “Sweetheart, I’ve told you before, but these fans aren’t toys, and you must never  _ ever _ use them unsupervised. They are dangerous weapons and should be treated and respected as such. Do I make myself clear?”

Her daughter looked down in disappointment. “Yes, mother.”

The woman continued to watch her for a moment, and considered something. “Have you been continuing your stretches and exercises with Baki?”

The girl nodded hesitantly.

“And how far did you make it through the water dance?”

At this, her face again brightened, thinking back on her dance session. “I made it all the way through and I didn’t have to stop to check once! I mean, I did almost fall that one time…” she grew quiet when her mother let out another sigh.

“Child, you are going to send me to an early grave.” She crouched down so that she was kneeling on the floor and gently pulled her son over so that he could stand in front of her as well. “How about we make a deal.”

Both children watched her expectantly.

“If you both continue to listen to Baki during your training sessions  _ and  _ behave during the council meetings, I’ll talk to your father about having a set of wooden  _ non-bladed _ fans and puppets made so you can  _ safely  _ learn how to-”

She cut off when both of the children lunged towards her, each pledging themselves to uphold their end of the deal, and each trying to nestle themselves closer. She chuckled quietly and enveloped the children in her arms.

Shikamaru hovered in the shadows, feeling more and more uncomfortable watching the scene before him. Even though he knew that he would relive a part of her past, he felt like an unwanted intruder on something that was precious and private. He had seen the weapons that she wore in their present times, had seen the proof of her prowess; he had expected to share a memory of blood and victory, as was common with the harpies who lived in the mountains near his home. This obvious display of love and devotion was foreign to him, and left a feeling of hollow resentment simmering in the back of his mind, even as the scene slowly faded into blackness.

She had been human, and she had been loved. How did she end up alone, murdering those who wandered through the desert?

* * *

When he opened his eyes, he had just enough time to register the stifling heat beating down on his skin and the dull pounding in the back of his skull before he felt the breath knocked from his lungs, a heavy weight pinning him to the sandy ground and a sharp blade hovering over his neck.

“What did you do to me?” Her voice came out as a hiss and her eyes blazed in anger. He blearily noticed that even her wings were vibrating in the air, unable to contribute to the situation, but thrumming with the energy of her emotions.

He scrambled to think of the best way to answer her question, resisting the urge to shake his head to clear his thoughts and which would undoubtedly impale his neck on the knife that hovered just above his skin. He found his mind sluggish from the exhaustion of the past several days and preoccupied with the juxtaposition between the small girl he had seen in the vision and the vicious woman currently threatening his life. Unfortunately, she misunderstood the intent of his silence, and lifted him by the front of his shirt before slamming him heavily back into the ground. “Don’t even  _ think _ of trying anything. One wrong move and this knife goes through your jugular.”

He glowered back at her, his patience finally cracking. “That knife goes through my jugular and we both die.”

“You’re lying.” Her voice was flat, but her wings paused in their movement, giving away her doubts.

“If you actually  _ gave me a chance to explain _ , you’d know that I’m not.” The sun was still high in the sky, and the intense light only fed his headache. “Besides, if I truly wanted to escape, I would just sink into your shadow again.”

Her eyes narrowed, but the knife drifted just a hair further from his skin. “You’re bluffing. I may not know all of the details of your magic, but I  _ do _ know that you are drained. Otherwise you would have done it sooner.”

“ _ I _ may have been drained… but  _ we  _ were not.”

She remained silent, weighing the implications of his words. Inside himself, at the core of his magic, he felt a strange sensation, almost like a faint tug before she shoved herself off of him, her teeth bared in anger. “What… how…  _ you bound me? _ ”

Shikamaru rubbed at the front of his neck, checking for damage, and rolled onto his side, taking a deep breath of air. “If it makes you feel any better, we’re both bound to each other. I share in your magic, and you share in my life force; neither of us will age, but if either of us die, the other will suffer the same fate.”

“No! It doesn’t  _ make me feel better. _ I already don’t age- now I just get to  _ not age _ while babysitting a  _ fae-like _ parasite while he consumes my magic!”

He drew silent, recognizing that there was nothing he could say to quell her anger.

She stormed away for a few paces and stopped, staring off at the seemingly endless stretch of sand, the dunes rolling like waves into the horizon. After a moment, she took a deep breath and let out one of the loudest shouts he had ever heard in his life before turning back and returning to his side.

“What do you want?”

“Honestly, a chance to get out of the sun would be great.”

Quick as a snake, she slapped him upside of his head. “Don’t be smart with me. You know what I meant.”

He let out a sigh. There was nothing to be gained from explaining that he really  _ did _ need to get out of the sun soon. “I just need your help getting back to my forest.”

“Sure, go east.”

He glared at her. “Now who’s being smart?” He tried to slow his breathing, feeling lightheaded from the spike in anger. “I think it’s pretty obvious that I wouldn’t stand a chance getting back on my own.”

“How long did it take you to get here?”

“I can’t be sure, but maybe around three days or so?”

She propped her hand on her hip and watched him carefully. “So, you’re telling me that if I escort you to your forest, then you’ll release me from this bond?”

“Yes.”

“And after that, I’ll be completely free from you- no more stealing my magic, no more reading my thoughts-”

“I mean, I can’t actually read your thoughts now-”

“You’ll stop seeing my memories?”

Even though nothing had changed in her tone and her expression was as unreadable as the desert sands around them, Shikamaru saw her fist clench at her side and her wings tense against her back, as if she was preparing for a fight. Although she was definitely displeased about him feeding on her magic, he realized that the root of her anger was this; the recognition that something so precious and private was now freely accessible to another.

A vulnerability.

Not in the truest sense of the word; it didn’t make her any less dangerous, but for the first time since she had pinned him to the sand Shikamaru could see a ghost of the little girl she had once been.

“I’ll stop seeing your memories.” He waited a moment, watching for her reaction, and he felt a heavy weight settle in his chest. It had been a long time since he had felt guilty for his actions, but now that his freedom was all but assured, his mind was more than happy to remind him that it was only thanks to the intervention of the woman before him. An intervention that was rewarded by trapping her in a life bond against her will and invading the privacy of her mind. The heavy weight only continued to grow, inciting a driving frenzy to justify his actions, to explain his decision, to earn her forgiveness.

The apology was on the tip of his tongue when his eyes met the vacant stare of the corpse of his captor, still sprawled in the sun. The man’s face was gaunt, drained of the shrewd confidence that made him such a formidable opponent in life. The body was sprawled beside the remains of his comrades, and while he begrudged the men for their role in his capture and their intent to exchange his life for gold, they didn’t die as some sort of retribution for their crimes against  _ him _ .

He once again turned to face the harpy, and felt the apology and the guilt fade away in the silence. Yes, he had seen a small snippet of the girl she once was, and brief flashes of emotion, but the truth was that she was a stranger who had murdered an entire band of men for nothing more than being in the wrong place at the wrong time. A stranger who would undoubtedly leave him alone to die in the middle of the desert if given the choice.

The last of the guilt dissolved, leaving an uneasy wariness in its place.

She finally gave him a slight nod and turned away. “Fine, it’s a deal.” Her voice sounded slightly muffled, and his headache returned with a vengeance. He unconsciously reached up to rub his temple and found his skin slick with sweat and cold to the touch.

“Shit.”

He blinked, and found the world had lost its focus, and, even more alarming, the line between the sky and the horizon had begun to shift and roll. His body collapsed into the sand and his mind plunged into darkness.


End file.
